On the second day of our week-long trip through central Portugal, we spend the day at the Convento de Cristo, aka Convent of Christ, a beautiful UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the most important Templar cities on the Iberian peninsula.

Learning local cuisines around the world is one of my favorite activities, and a Portuguese cooking class while traveling through the Center of Portugal was a must for our itinerary. Most cooking classes are in Lisbon or Porto, but there’s a unique one halfway between those two cities at the Cooking and Nature Emotional Hotel. The hotel itself is wonderful to stay at with different sensory rooms and plenty of landmarks in the surrounding landscape.

Obidos is a beautiful medieval town in central Portugal that you simply have to visit if you’re in the country. It’s located about an hour north of Lisbon, and two hours south of Porto. At the center of this fortified, hilltop town is a castle dating back to the 13th century, although the Moors built a castle there in the 8th century, and Romans had a fort before that. In other words, the town is very rich in history.

I was quite excited when I first noticed the Chocolatarium museum in Edinburgh. I mentioned it on my food tours, but I knew I needed to visit myself. Now that I’ve been, I can definitely recommend it as an awesome attraction in Scotland’s capital.

Portland is my favorite city in the US. While Vanesa and I were working at a hostel in Seattle, we had a chance to spend 48 hours in Portland, visiting my favorite attractions, eating the best food, and staying at the nicest hostel I’ve seen in the US.